


M7-97

by tess1978



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 3, Fallout 4
Genre: Angst, Backstory, F/M, Feels, First Kiss, Friendship, Implied Sexual Content, Innocent romance, Kissing, Major Original Character(s), Prequel, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-12 20:22:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5679505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tess1978/pseuds/tess1978
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two synths find happiness together. But it isn't safe. To escape the Institute, they need help from an unexpected source.</p>
            </blockquote>





	M7-97

**Author's Note:**

> My headcanon backstory for one of my favourite Fallout 4 characters. 
> 
> This story contains minor plot spoilers for Fallout 3 and kind of a big spoiler for Fallout 4, although it's not, like, super in your face.

CHAPTER 1

The air was artificially sweet, and slightly stale, the temperature a steady 21 degrees celsius, and the artificial sun shone gently as M7-97 stepped into the Atrium. He was tall for a synth, with dark brown hair and eyes, and his Institute uniform stretched slightly as he walked towards the Medical bay.

He’d begun to be concerned as late that there may be an error in his programming. He’d been finding himself more and more often in the Biology lab, often when there was no reason to be there. He’d been coming up with excuses to be there. But the real reason was because of JL-18. 

She worked in the Biology lab. Her job was to clean the lab equipment. His similar duties in Robotics often brought them together in the supply rooms, and their casual nods had expanded into actual conversations about each other’s day, food supplements, and the like. He’d started thinking of her when she wasn’t around. 

Most Gen 3 synths were dark haired, like Father. But somehow, the way their random Genes spliced together, she had ended up with a light strawberry blonde colour that caught the light and shimmered when she walked. M7-97 often caught himself thinking of it in odd moments. And so he would go to Biology, and asked where the disinfectant or whatever he could think of was, and then she would smile at him and point him in the right direction, and his heart would beat just a little faster.

The heart palpitations was what sent him to Medical today. He didn’t know if it was because of a programming issue or maybe something wrong with his biological functioning, but he’d never felt this way before in the year since he had been manufactured. 

He sat still and stared straight ahead while Dr. Volkert examined him. He said he was having occasional heart issues, and that he was unsure of the cause. Volkert heard nothing through his stethoscope, however. 

“There’s nothing wrong with you. I don’t have time for you synths to come here every time you have a sliver. If it’s bothering you that much, you can request a reset.” With that, he stood, dismissing M7-97.

M7-97 returned to his duties, unsatisfied.

***

The next evening, he was headed out of the cafeteria, food supplement in hand, when he bumped into JL-18 coming in. 

His hand reached out to steady her, and she smiled up into his face.

He apologized to her, and then on the spur of the moment, he asked if she would like to come eat with him. He had a spot under the trees he liked to go, he said. She agreed to meet him there.

M7-97 headed that way, his heart palpitating more than ever.

A few minutes later, he looked up as she sat next to him on the bench. 

“Food supplement 45.” she said.

“Food supplement 56.” he replied. 

They sat in silence a moment. 

“I haven’t tried that one yet.”

“Here, taste.” he said, and offered her a spoonful. She didn’t take the spoon but instead opened her mouth, and he placed the spoon in her mouth, and fed it to her.

“Mmm.” she said. 

And they sat there together in companionable silence.

After they finished, JL-18 rose to leave. Then she turned to him and smiled. May I eat with you again tomorrow? M7-97 nodded and she turned and left.

That night, as he lay in his bunk, his mind kept drifting back to JL-18 and her mouth on his spoon. He didn’t know why he was fixated on that. Whatever error he had must be getting worse.

 

CHAPTER TWO

M7-97 did not go for a reset, however. He continued to visit Biology on increasingly flimsy pretenses, and he ate his food supplement with JL-18 every evening under the trees. 

He was starting to enjoy the heart palpitations.

One day, he headed to Biology, ostensibly for rags. When he entered the lab, he saw a scientist shouting at JL-18. Apparently she had broken a test tube. The scientist was yelling at her and gesturing wildly, threatening to have her reset. JL-18 did nothing but hang her head in shame, and finally when she was dismissed, she headed down the hallway to the storage area.

He was feeling an emotion he had never felt before in his short existence. His teeth and fists were clenching involuntarily, and he felt like hitting the scientist. Synths were not permitted to be violent, however, so he choked down the feeling and followed JL-18 down the hall.

When he found her, she was sitting on a crate, her face in her hands. A strange sound was coming from her, and he felt his chest tighten as he looked at her. She heard his footsteps as he came in, and seeing it was him, she stood, and stepping closer, she wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his chest. 

Without knowing what he was doing, he wrapped his arm around her shoulders. She looked up at his face, her eyes wet, and said “I don’t want to be reset, M7. I don’t want to forget you. I’m so afraid.”

M7 realized he was afraid too. The thought of her looking past him, blankness in her eyes, sent a chill down his spine. 

“You just have to be careful. We both do.”

He looked down at her, and she tentatively smiled. He felt like the only thing he wanted in the world was to protect her. His mind suddenly flashed to his spoon in her mouth, and suddenly, he felt the urge to press his lips to hers. The urge was strong, so he gave in, and bending his head, kissed her gently. 

She didn’t pull away, but instead leaned into him, her lips soft and warm against his.

After a moment she pulled back and smiled at him. “Thank you”

***

The next few weeks flew by. M7 and JL became much more cautious about their work, and about being seen together, unwilling to risk anything that might induce a reset as punishment. Anything other than perfect conformity was grounds for suspicion, and so they found ways to spend time together in secret.

M7 discovered an old, abandoned wing of rooms, and he and JL started spending more and more time there. They ate their food supplements, or talked, and sometimes they pressed their lips together shyly. Often they sat quietly with their fingers wound together. M7 loved the feel of the soft skin between her fingers.

 

CHAPTER THREE

M7 and JL were mostly successful at hiding their relationship. But they didn’t go completely unnoticed. Zimmer, the head of the Synth Retention Bureau, was a sharp man, always watching for any anomalies in synth behaviour. He was naturally suspicious of synths, convinced in the deepest recesses of his soul that they were all going to turn on him one day, and without very tight control, they would overwhelm and conquer the Institute. 

And so, one day, he called his best courser into his office.

A3-21 reported to Zimmer’s office as requested. He was one of the first Gen 3 synths to be trained as a courser, and at four years old, he was the oldest still working as such. He’d seen a lot of things in that time. He’d seen escaped synths run, and cry, fight and try to hide as he tracked them down and brought them in. He sometimes saw the reset synths going about their duties in the Institute, and something about their dead eyes bothered him.

Zimmer had an unusual assignment for A3 today. He wasn’t to track down a rogue synth, but this time, to follow a pair of synths that were behaving strangely. They’d been going off together somewhere, and Zimmer wanted to know where they were going and what they were doing.

And so, A3-21 began following M7-97 and JL-18.

It took only a few days to figure out where they were going. They had a spot in an abandoned lab where they would go and eat together. He followed them, curious, and watched them for three days to see what they were plotting. 

But as far as he could tell, they weren’t plotting anything. Instead, something shifted in A3’s chest as he watched them from cover, their fingers twined together, whispering and looking into each other’s eyes. 

A3 came to the conclusion that there was no way he could take that away from them. He couldn’t stand by and watch as that light in their eyes was darkened and they went cold and blank. And so he came to his decision.

A3 turned in his report to Zimmer, stating that he found nothing unusual with the pair, that their schedules just happened to be synced up by coincidence.

He was aware that the danger was not past, however. So one day, he headed into Robotics, and finding M7 there, checking off items on a clipboard, he ordered M7 to follow him and lend him assistance.

***

M7’s heart pounded in terror as he followed the courser, A3-21 was well known as the best courser in the institute. If he was here, it was all over for certain. Panic began rising in his chest as he tried to think of some way to escape. His eyes shot around frantically, but he knew there wasn’t anywhere he could run, and so he followed A3 meekly down a secluded hallway.

When they were out of sight, A3 stopped him with a hand on his arm.  
“They are suspicious.” A3 told the other synth. “It’s only a matter of time. You’re going to have to find a way to escape.” 

M7 couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You’re… you’re not here to reset me?” he asked, incredulous.

“No,” sighed A3. “I can’t. I can’t do this anymore.” He ran a hand through his hair. “I’m going to leave, but I need help, and I want you and JL-18 to help me. If you think they are relentless when they go after normal synths, imagine the reaction when a courser runs. I think we have a chance together. I can get us out of the institute, but I need you and JL to spend the next couple days gathering what we need for the road. I can’t collect supplies other than ammo without arousing suspicion. Both of you, meet me here in three days, and we will go. I think I know some people who can help us on the outside.”

***

M7’s voice shook later that evening as he told JL about his conversation with the courser. She began crying, and he wrapped her arms around her. “It will be ok,” he said. “We’ll have a courser with us. Nothing can beat a courser. And it’s A3, he’s legendary!”

JL calmed down a bit, and they stood together for a long time.

 

CHAPTER FOUR

Three days later, the three synths met up in the abandoned corridor. A3 handed M7 and JL a laser pistol each, and instructed them as quickly as he could on how to use it. They quickly assessed their supplies, and then headed to the Molecular Relay room. 

A3 could teleport himself out of the institute, but he needed to get the other synths out first. He told them to step onto the pad. He explained there would be a bright blue light, and then they would be somewhere else, and that he would be right behind them.

He watched as they laced their fingers together and looked into each other’s eyes, and then he hit the button. 

“You aren’t going to escape this easily.” The voice came from behind him. A3 turned to find Zimmer standing there. Behind him was another courser, S3-47, who A3 had trained himself. 

“You’ve been an effective weapon, but you are malfunctioning, and you need to be reset.”

“I am not malfunctioning! Since when is self determination a malfunction?”

S3-47 raised his weapon and pointed it at A3. “Activate A3-21 rec-”

Before he could finish, A3 activated the chip in his head, and in a flash, he was gone. 

“They’re right behind us!” he shouted, as soon as he saw M7 and JL. “We need to run”

It took them several hours to lose the synths and S3-47 who were following them, but A3 was familiar with their tactics, and soon they found themselves safe in an abandoned building. A3 kept watch while M7 and JL fell asleep in each other’s arms.

A3 had had his suspicions about who had been helping escaped synths, but he had not acted on it as of yet. He had wanted to work out his feelings first. But the next morning, he would head in that direction and see if the Railroad could help.

***

Victoria Watts looked up from her paperwork, as she heard shouting at the entrance of their headquarters. “A courser! A courser has found us!”

Victoria felt panic rise in her throat. There was no way they would be able to stop a courser if it invaded their HQ. She didn’t know how it had found them, but she knew they had to at least try to stop it. She grabbed her pistol and ran towards the entrance.

She vaguely aware when she arrived that nobody had started shooting yet. But the sight that met her eyes when she rounded the corner was still astounding. She recognized the courser. They had pictures of several coursers in their records, and all Railroad recruits were required to memorize their faces in order to avoid them. This courser had been in their records the longest, and was the deadliest. But he wasn’t attacking them now. He was standing there, his hands in the air, with two frightened looking synths clutching each other behind his back.

“We need help” he said, simply, when Victoria appeared.

 

CHAPTER FIVE

M7 had never been as afraid as he had been for the last several hours. The harrowing escape and the night in the cold abandoned building, followed by the threatening reaction from the people A3 had assured him would help, was all so much to take in. But as afraid as he was for himself, he was even more afraid for JL. He wrapped his arms around her and promised himself he would protect her. 

He watched as A3 raised his hands in the air. After a long, tense moment, the dark-skinned woman who seemed to be in charge lowered her weapon. “Come along” she said. 

M7 followed the woman and A3 as they went inside.

A3 was talking with the leader, when another woman approached M7 and JL and told them to follow her. “We’ll get you settled in.” she said.

M7 refused to let JL out of his sight, as the woman, Amari, who claimed she was a doctor, smiled at them, and checked them over. They had no injuries, but she was kind, and she spent a moment with JL reassuring her that they were safe now, and that they would find a way to stay that way.

JL smiled, the first smile since they had decided to run, and M7’s heart leapt at the sight. Without though, he leaned down and kissed her. Amari smiled at the sight. She’d seen several escaped synths come through but never a pair as obviously in love as these two. 

M7 looked up as A3 and Victoria approached them. “We won’t be able to stay here long” he said. “Victoria has decided to accompany us to the Capital Wasteland. There are railroad members there who can help us start a new life.” 

Victoria said, “We’d been considering it a long time, but we are starting to think that we need to move our headquarters. If you can find us, than other coursers will be able to as well. We’re going to combine the move with your transport, and hopefully the distractions we have planned will help cover both operations.”

***

M7 and JL spent the next three days helping where they could. JL had a knack for medical tasks, and was assigned to assist Dr. Amari where possible. A3 had tried to teach them both to use weapons effectively, but only M7 showed a real talent for it, and soon A3 took to training him in earnest. “You would have made a good courser” he told him.

***

The departure from the railroad went without incident. It was a week long trek to the Capital Wasteland, and the three synths and Victoria began their trek with some trepidation, but also hope.

They traveled at night, and holed up in whatever shelter they could find during the day. M7 and JL fell asleep each morning wrapped in each other’s arms, foreheads pressed together, while A3 and Victoria discussed their options.

Doctor Amari had given Victoria a holotape before they left. It held instructions for a new procedure she had developed. It was a memory wipe, and she thought as a last resort they could use the technique to wipe the synths of their memories and implant new ones, allowing the synths to better blend into their new homes. 

A3 considered the idea for himself, but he didn’t think the idea would go over well with M7 and JL. The whole reason they escaped was so they could be together. Wiping their minds would destroy their memories of each other and thus their relationship, which was the whole reason for their escape in the first place. They may as well have stayed in the institute and been reset.

 

CHAPTER SIX

The first two days on the road were uneventful. But on the third day, A3 began to suspect they were being followed. His senses were on high alert as he began watching for anything that seemed out of place. 

On the fourth day, he saw a Gen 2 synth. 

He saw two more on the fifth day. He realized that these were scouts, and the coursers wouldn’t be far behind. He discussed it with his companions, and they all agreed that they needed to pick up the pace, and maybe find somewhere to hole up for a bit. The Gen 1 and 2 synths were often sent out as scouts, since they didn’t need to eat or sleep. Coursers, like all Gen 3 synths, were almost entirely biological, and as such they needed sleep and food like any human. A3 figured they had a day at best before the coursers caught up with them. 

The plan was to head to Rivet City, a city built into an aircraft carrier in the Capital Wasteland. There were scientists and doctors there who could help with their integration. But they decided they couldn’t head there right away, as the place wouldn’t be safe for them with coursers on their tail. So instead they headed for the settlement of Megaton, a walled village built from a crashed airliner with an active nuclear bomb at the centre.

***

M7 and JL looked around. They’d slept in some unpleasant places on the road to Megaton, so as grimy as this room seemed compared to the sterile whiteness of the Institute, at least it had a bed. And for the first time since their escape, they were alone.

It had been an overwhelming ten days. M7 found he had feelings and emotions he’d never had before. Fear, anger, hope, happiness. He could identify all of those. But when he looked at JL the complex mess of feelings overwhelmed him. He wanted to be close to her, and protect her, and kiss her, and hold her close. He lived for her laughter and smiles, and seeing fear or sadness in her eyes made him want to smash the world to make it better for her. He didn’t know what all these feelings were, but he knew he never ever wanted to be apart from her.

JL looked up at M7. She knew what the feeling was. She had been talking with Dr. Amari before they left, and she had told her.

It was love. 

JL raised her hand to M7’s face and looked into his brown eyes. She loved him, and she knew he loved her too, and some way, somehow, this was all going to work out. 

She pulled his face to hers for a kiss, and they lay on the bed together, and they loved each other.

***

Everyone could see it. For the next week as the foursome lay low in Megaton, everyone could see how much M7 and JL were in love. They were always together, always close, fingers entwined, hands touching faces, cheeks reddened like newlyweds. But the time had come. There had been no sign of any synths or coursers for days. Victoria needed to head back to the Commonwealth, and A3 needed to get them settled in Rivet City.

 

CHAPTER SEVEN

It was night when they headed out. The Capital Wasteland was a dangerous place, infested with super mutants above ground and ghouls below. The Brotherhood of Steel had recently set up shop in a complex that had once been known as the Pentagon, but, uncertain of the Brotherhood’s goals, they decided to avoid that area. 

***

A3 pulled M7 aside when they stopped for a quick bite. “I’m going to have my memory wiped, and maybe a face change when we get to Rivet City.” he said. “I’m a courser, I don’t know how I will be able to hide that. The only way I will be able to blend in is to believe I am human.”

M7 nodded. “You’ve been a good friend. I’ll be there for you if you need it.” A3 took his M7’s hand and shook it, saying “we’re more than friends. We’re brothers.”

***

Half an hour later, they were laughing together and finishing their meal, preparing to finish their trip. It was maybe an hour further to Rivet City. Neither M7 nor A3 saw the Gen 2 synth creep up behind them, and slowly, cautiously, raise its rifle. 

The laser shot blasted JL onto her back, the black burn on her clothing indicating the source. A3 shot to his feet, eyes scanning the area. He caught sight of the synth and gave chase, easily catching it and shooting its leg out from underneath it. He grabbed it by the shoulders and yelled into it’s face “Where are the others?” The synth was programmed to obey coursers, even if the courser was the one it was hunting, and so it replied, “I am alone” before A3, in his rage, crushed its head between his hands. 

He raced back to the others.

Victoria stood when he approached. “She’s badly hurt.” she said. “The stimpacks aren’t helping. We have to get to the doctor in Rivet City.

A3 looked over at M7. He was crouched over JL, shouting in her face to not die, pressing his hands to her burned chest. He had injected every stimpack they had, but her skin was still sliding off under his fingers. He looked up at A3 in desperation. A3 gathered their things as quickly as possible, and then told M7, “You’ll have to carry her.”

M7 was tall for a synth, and strong. He gathered JL into his arms. She seemed light as a feather as they started out, practically at a run. But she soon grew heavier in his arms as they went along. “Stay with me JL” he practically sobbed, as her moans and gasps grew fewer and farther between. Her weight dragged at him, slowing him, and eventually bringing him to his knees. 

Her eyes opened and she looked at him. Her hand came up to touch his face. “M….” 

Her hand fell away and her eyes closed, and she let out one last breath, and she was gone. 

A3 had never heard a sound like the one that came from M7 at that moment. He kneeled on the ground, JL held to his chest, a keening cry pouring from his lips as he roared his grief to the sky. A3 and Victoria turned their heads aside from this private expression of pain. 

***

“I’m going to do it too.”

A3 looked at the broken man who’d escaped the Institute with him. He hadn’t said much since the day they arrived in Rivet City. The grief had never left his eyes, and he’d lost weight as food and drink sat untouched before him. A3 had come to say his farewell, as he was headed to meet Dr. Pinkerton, the man Amari had referred him to for a memory wipe. 

“Are you sure?”

M7 looked up at his brother with red rimmed eyes. “I can’t live like this. I’d rather have no memories at all than…” 

He buried his face in his hands. “All I see is her…. dying in front of my eyes. Over and over. And there’s nothing I could do to help. I couldn’t save her.”

A3 nodded. He reached down and taking his brother by the hand, pulled him to his feet. Let’s go, he said.

 

\--EPILOGUE--

Two years later.

The radio blasted the end of a song. Three-Dog was back on, rambling on about someone who busted out of Vault 101 looking for her dad. 

Harkness watched the two Brotherhood initiates as they crossed the bridge to Rivet City, laughing together. They were former Rivet City scrap merchants who’d recently joined the Brotherhood, and they did everything together, even join the Brotherhood. 

They were still seen often in the Muddy Rudder whenever they had R&R. Harkness had always been a little jealous of their easy camaraderie. 

“Cutler. Danse.” he nodded at them as they passed. 

They paid him no mind. Security Chief Harkness was a fixture at the Rivet City entrance.

Harkness couldn’t put his finger on why, but he felt like there was something missing from his life when he looked at Danse. And sometimes he thought he caught a look in the other man’s brown eyes that almost looked like….sorrow.


End file.
